Today’s sermon was about Jeremiah 29 and how most of our faith is making the mundane holy. Showing up for the smallest things so others can feel loved and whole.
And the pastor compared our church building to the TARDIS because it’s bigger on the inside. 
Nice. I had to Google TARDIS
My church is going through a series on the minor prophets. Today was Haggai. The pastor talked about how a lot of Haggai is extorting the Jews to rebuild God’s temple - something they had neglected since returning from exile. The theme of God’s presence was emphasized. The temple was God’s presence to the Jews and to all the nations, and multiple times God reminds the Jews through Haggai that he is with them.
This week me did Zechariah, apparently the most quoted minor prophet in the New Testament. One of the themes discussed was God promising to take action in many different ways, but not immediately, and how back then, and perhaps now, it seems as if God is not active in the world.
We had a pretty casual fellowship at DenFur instead of a service. But meeting other Christian furries is always a blessing! It was good to hear multiple perspectives on the faith and the fandom.
TRIGGER WARNING:
There was one fur who shared a story of abuse and wanted to know what Christians were doing about it. I told him that while I don’t have all the answers, they are still loved, they didn’t deserve any of what happened to them, and that I want to seek ways to address and confront the abuse that “Christians” are still committing. We had some good hugs and prayer!
On this day before Labor Day, our message mentioned a rallying cry from the early days of the labor movement: “8 hours for work, 8 hours for rest, 8 hours for what we will!”
It was connected to Micah chapter 6:6-8, where God has shown us what is required of us: do justice, love kindness, and walk humbly with God. There are so many ways that we can do all 3 of these things, so many opportunities to engage with people. And when we do, we don’t just live. We thrive!
Our sermon was about how the Book of James tells us not to show favoritism toward people who are different from us, especially the less privileged!
One speaker in church today talked about the twin laws of Sacrifice and Consecration. The Law of Sacrifice calls us to give up whatever is preventing us from becoming more like our Heavenly Father. This could obviously include sinful behavior, but it could also include things that aren’t sinful, and maybe are even good in their own way, but are distracting us from things that are more important.
The Law of Consecration, on the other hand, calls us to take what we have and rather than giving it up, using it for the blessing of others and the building of God’s Kingdom. This could include our physical possessions or our skills and talents.
One thing that was really comforting to me was when the speaker said that God knows we can’t do everything our hearts long to do. But if we do what we are able in order to align our will more closely to His, it will be acceptable to Him.
So I attended a Wednesday night prayer service at a local Episcopal church in an area swamped with almost nothing but Southern Baptist adjacent congregations, mostly looking for a place where I can share fellowship with a community who will accept me as I am with no contingencies, so I can focus squarely on my walk with Christ. This was my first service I’ve been to in about 8 years, and needless to say, despite my desire to grow closer to God and find good fellowship, I felt incredibly out of place for a majority of the time.
Everyone there was very friendly… for all 13 of the people in attendance (I counted). I figured it would be small but I was expecting closer to around 50 people ahaha. Now I absolutely don’t have an issue with the amount of people that were there- 5 or 5,000, I’m just looking for fellowship in Christ, which was definitely there for sure and I clicked with a few of the people I spoke to, but… hm. I don’t know. There was a slight sense of “joining the club” that I’m not sure jived with me, but that’s entirely a me problem. I mentioned in my testimony thread about the sort of “spirit animal” life I feel God has shown me that I feel very comfortable living- that is, being a bit of a loner and drifter, showing up and being present as I feel compelled to, not bound to any obligations and not required to participate, but free to do so at my own discretion and spiritual calling. To basically show up in people’s lives or communities upon conviction and then disappear back into the night, going wherever the Holy Spirit may lead me to next.
They were sure to express that I am welcome to come and go as I desire, and despite being Episcopal, invited me to join their services no matter what I believe, which was very much appreciated, but I think my point of contention lies within how basically everyone there was like “this is my forever home, this is my community” which is not something I presently feel called to tie myself down to. If I need/want to disappear for 6 months before I suddenly show back up again one day, I’d like to feel safe doing so. Not to say that I don’t, but it does feel like I am the only one there who would appear so sporadically. I really do wish I could attend as a spirit- nobody can see me, nobody can hear me, but I am still present and enjoying the service nonetheless. If I feel compelled to communicate with someone I trust, I can, but otherwise am left alone to do as I please.
I don’t blame the reverend, Father Rob, for really wanting me to consider becoming Episcopalian, but I just do not feel any conviction in my heart to subscribe to a specific denomination. I truly believe God has shown me the things I’ve seen and led me to the people I’ve met for good reason, so I don’t feel like brute forcing this for the earthly desire to be included in a group of people when I have consistently been happier alone. That’s not to say I’m giving up- quite the contrary, I will almost certainly be going back next Wednesday, but I think if I don’t feel a deep spiritual connection forming, I should probably put up boundaries and make my passing visits more clear. Ironically, what I feel most in my heart’s conviction from tonight isn’t God telling me “this is your forever home”, but more like “what did you think? Is this community right for you?” which is certainly interesting to say the least.
As for the actual service itself, it was made of two parts: a 30 minute prayer and worship session, then roughly an hour and a half of LGBTQ+ informed discussion of religious topics. The first part was alright I suppose, but I only vaguely recognized one song (and didn’t know the words to any), and for the prayer and reading, there was quite a lot of unison answering and chant-like response, which is something I have never jived with and, as a rebellious anarchistic soul, is something I will never do as long as I live lol, but I was pleased to see the others felt it in their hearts to participate.
The second part was much nicer, they served pizza (but I didn’t eat any because I had just eaten prior to driving over) and we all sat around discussing theology for a few until the greater discussion started. I mostly remained silent and sat in the very back (again, wandering spirit passing through), but it was fine because I didn’t have much to say and was graciously happy to listen to all the other diverse perspectives. We did watch this one video though, and it hit hilariously close to home for me as I basically agreed with every point the guy brought up, and it directly compared to the Jesus-coded comic series I’m working on called Praxis, which was a term he used prominently in the video to illustrate his theology points as well, so I thought that was especially interesting and took the liberty to bring it up.
Outside of also having two other members visibly perk up at the mention of being a writer and artist and being influenced by Narnia, that was basically the whole night. I can’t remember anyone’s names properly beyond the reverend, but I did apologize to them in advance that my memory is clinically bad, and they seemed understanding. I’ll probably report back with how next week goes. Father Rob invited me to attend Sundays too, but I tried my best to gently express my disinterest for the time being. I very much appreciate the casual fellowship nature of tonight’s gathering as opposed to a fanciful, ritualistic type Sunday event.
P.S. I alluded to coming to the church for their stance as a safe haven for non-conforming identities, but I did not come out as a robot or anything. It didn’t feel proper and I don’t know anyone well enough. It didn’t seem wise.